HP Congress will organize a Dhanyabad Rally in February in Dharamshala to thank CM Virbhadra Singh, to notify Dharamshala as the second Capital of Himachal after Shimla. Stating this Kewal Singh Pathania, Vice Chairman HP Forest Corporation said,” Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh is the only CM of Himachal Pradesh,who brought development to the merged areas (from Punjab) by creating facilities other then Shimla to a central approachable place named Dharamshala.”
Talking to Himvani in Dharamshala on Monday Sh. Pathania said,” Shanta Kumar and P K Dhumal together ruled Himachal for 15 years during their 4 terms, but never gave a single administrative office to Dharamshala or the surrounding areas. It is only Virbhadra Singh who started developing Dharamshala during his 2nd term as CM in 1985 when he shifted Board of School Education from Shimla to Dharamshala beside heavy opposition and satisfied the upper area people by saying that if lower area people can come to Shimla for their 99% of works ,what is the harm if people from Shimla can go to Dharamshala for just 1% work in Dharamshala.”
Pathania said that it is not a single day process to create Dharamshala as a State Capital, but it is a continuous process started by Virbhadra who started custom of Winter Sojourn in 1993 for one and a half month every year, which is still being carried out. Pathania further added, “Then CM created the offices of Chief Engineer PWD, IPH and Electricity in 1993. Later he started Vidhan Sabha session in Dharamshala and created permanent Vidhan Sabha Bhawan here and winter session is a permanent event here.”
He said that the City was later projected to be a Smart City and 2nd Municipal Corporation after Shimla only in the Chief Minister ship of Virbhadra Singh who also brought a Wing of HP University here and working to set up Central University in Dharamshala. Virbhadra announced Dharamshala as second Capital of HP State in 2017 during his 6th term in the office. Pathania said that the above related achievement confirms that the process to make Dharamshala a Capital was began in 1985 and nothing was done in this direction by BJP during their ruling years. Himachal is the third State in India after J&K and Maharashtra that has 2 Capitals.
